The production of the documentary series Fora do Armário, which premieres this Thursday (5) on HBO, had difficulties getting testimonials from famous people, even openly homosexual ones. Only two celebrities, Thammy Miranda and Jean Wyllys, agreed to report their experiences on camera for the series. “That was the only slightly negative surprise throughout this production. We approached several people who have even shyly acknowledged their sexual orientation. And many of them refused, they didn't feel comfortable discussing this subject further. We found this very strange. It is important for Brazil to talk about this openly”, laments Guto Barra, director of Fora do Armário. The episode about openly famous people is the sixth in the series and features Jean Wyllys, ex-BBB and federal deputy who fights for the LGBT cause in the National Congress, and Thammy Miranda, Gretchen's son who was born a woman and went through the gender transition process completely. in public, with frequent posts of the latest developments in her body on social media. Thammy's family also appears in the series, which seeks to show testimonials from people close to them and portraits of their daily lives, such as breakfast. According to director Tatiana Issa, the idea is to demystify and show humanity in gay, bisexual, transsexual and transgender people. “The vast majority of [TV] reports and programs focus on more negative aspects, often with a certain sensationalism. Our approach is to continue showing, of course, the difficulties that surround this universe, but also how they managed to overcome various problems, various barriers in life. Even to normalize something. Some of the strongest moments we see in the series come from banal everyday scenes,” he says. I cry every day Each of the ten episodes of Fora do Armário addresses a different issue in the LGBT community. Among them, the conflict of young gays with their religions, the drag queen scene, elderly people who are transgender and parents who reveal to their children that they are gay. The director herself went through a case like this in her family (her father came out as homosexual) and says that her experience at home made it easier to guide the characters' stories. “The fact that I had a personal life that mixed with their lives perhaps made things more intimate. The affectionate way in which we approached them made them open up. It was the first time the team was so involved in a series. We cried every day, it affected everyone, it transformed. Everyone identified in one way or another, because these are human issues, everyone has a father, son, brother, goes through family conflicts”, he says. With many moving testimonials, images from family albums and stories from all regions of the country, Tatiana hopes that the public will be able to see more and judge others less for their sexual orientations. “We hope that people understand that acceptance is the best way. The stories are complicated everywhere, [the series] is a portrait of Brazil too. I hope that people can understand that, the more we hear these stories, the more we understand that at the end of it all, after so much struggle, pain, sadness, complexity, what remains is love. Let that be the message”, he concludes.
